As soon as he became CM, DK Shivkumar played the game, made a dent in BJP and JDS in MLC elections.

There is a lot of discussion about the defeat of the Congress candidate in the Rajya Sabha elections of Jharkhand. Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) seems to be winning everywhere but BJP has suffered a major setback in Karnataka. This blow has been given by DK Shivakumar, who recently became the Chief Minister, in the Legislative Council elections. In the elections held on 7 seats of Karnataka Legislative Council, Congress could have won only 4 but by winning the fifth seat, it has shocked BJP and Janata Dal (Secular). Now BJP leaders are saying that they will take action against the MLAs who do cross voting. On the other hand, Congress’s morale is high.

After the change of Chief Minister in Karnataka, many leaders started raising rebellious voices. Along with changing the Chief Minister, Congress also changed the State President in Karnataka. Till now this post was with DK Shivakumar but when he became the Chief Minister, he made BK Hariprasad the President of Karnataka Congress. The first big test of this pair was the Legislative Council elections. DK Shivakumar, famous for crisis management, this time created a crisis in the opposition camp and managed to make his fifth candidate easily win.

Where did the game take place?

Senior Congress leader Randeep Surjewala said that Congress has 135 MLAs but its candidates got 151 votes. At the same time, BJP candidate got 7 votes less and Janata Dal (Secular) candidate got only 14 votes instead of 18. This claim of Randeep Surjewala and the victory of Congress shows that there was tremendous cross voting and Congress under the leadership of DK Shivakumar was successful in taking advantage of it.

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Understand the complete mathematics like this, the total number of members of Karnataka Assembly is 224 but at present two seats are vacant. One MLA has passed away and the other has lost his membership due to his conviction in a case. Of these 224, BJP has 64 MLAs and its ally JDS has 18 MLAs. Congress has 135 MLAs of its own. Three independent MLAs and two expelled BJP MLAs ST Somashekhar and Shivram Hebbar are also with the Congress. That means Congress was to get a total of 140 votes. Now Congress has got 151 votes. This is what has created a stir.

Mathematics of MLC elections

To win a seat in this Legislative Council election, 28 votes were required. 8 candidates had contested 7 seats. Congress could have won 4 seats on its own but it had also fielded a fifth candidate. On the other hand, BJP had fielded two candidates and JDS had fielded one candidate. Out of these, 5 candidates of Congress and 2 candidates of BJP have won while Govind Raju of JDS has lost the election.

Two BJP candidates were allotted 30 votes each but one candidate got 29 votes and the other only 27 votes. That means 4 votes have been reduced. The JDS candidate had to get at least 22 votes i.e. 4 BJP MLAs in addition to his 18 MLAs and he also had to rely on some cross voting. However, this is where things turned upside down. JDS candidate got only 14 votes i.e. 4 less than the total number of MLAs. This means that either the JDS candidate was not voted for by his own MLAs or the BJP MLAs did cross voting.

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This is what Randeep Surjewala has indicated. BJP candidates have got 4 less votes. JDS candidate also got 4 less votes whereas both together should have got 7 more votes. At the same time, Congress has got a total of 11 more votes. In such a situation, it is certain that cross voting has taken place. This is the reason why Karnataka BJP leaders are now saying that action will be taken against those doing cross voting.

What did BJP say?

Leader of Opposition in Karnataka Assembly R Ashok said in a press conference that cross voting has taken place and he will also find out it. He said, ‘We had allotted 31 votes to Raghu Kautilya. He got only 27 votes and one vote was invalid. We had allotted 30 votes to Lingaraj Patil, he got only 29. We had allotted 4 votes to JDS candidates.

At the same time, Congress had allotted only 28-28 votes to its 4 candidates. Despite this, PV Mohan got 29 votes. At the same time, Karnataka Congress President BK Hariprasad, T Kumkanur and Shivanna Malavalli got 30-30 votes. In this way his 119 votes were spent on these 4 candidates. The 32 votes received by the fifth candidate Vinay Karthik surprised everyone.

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This is being considered as the success of the new pair of DK Shivakumar and BK Hariprasad in Karnataka. Despite the alleged displeasure of all the MLAs and ministers, DK Shivkumar and Congress not only succeeded in keeping their MLAs united but also made a huge dent in the opposition camp. BJP is surprised by this cross voting and JDS is also feeling the need to look into its own clan.